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| Author | Amahl Bishara |
|---|---|
| Genre | |
| Publisher | Stanford University Press |
| ISBN | 978-1-5036-3137-3 |
Crossing a Line: Laws, Violence, and Roadblocks to Palestinian Political Expression is a nonfiction book by Amahl Bishara. The book is an ethnography of political expression for Palestinian citizens of Israel and Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, based on Bishara's field research in the region.
Crossing a Line was published by Stanford University Press in 2022. It received positive reviews.
Amahl Bishara is an associate professor of anthropology at Tufts University and a Palestinian American. Her father's side of the family are Palestinian citizens of Israel, [1] and she also has an Israeli passport; her partner has familial ties to Aida Refugee Camp [2] in the West Bank. Bishara conducted previous field research into journalism in the West Bank during the Second Intifada, [1] while traveling to Galilee to visit her family. [3] This research culminated in her first book, Back Stories: U.S. News Production and Palestinian Politics. [1] Overall, she has spent more than 20 years conducting fieldwork in the occupied Palestinian territories and Israel, leading her to see the ways Palestinians experience political expression and action in different ways depending on their location and background. [1]
I was inspired to write this book both by my life experiences and through a sense of intellectual and political urgency.
Amahl Bishara [1]
Crossing a Line was published by Stanford University Press in 2022. [1] It is 350 pages long. [4]
Crossing a Line is an ethnography of the political aspects of expression for Palestinian citizens of Israel as well as Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, specifically exploring the fragmentation and connection of Palestinians between and beyond these two regions. Rather than comparing the regions, Bishara states that "distinct threats to expression in different parts of Palestine compound limits on expression for all Palestinians". [1]
The first chapter discusses the name Palestine and its shifting connotations over time. Each subsequent chapter explores a different method of expression and how it is utilized on either side of the Green Line. These include protests in Lod and Bethlehem against the 2014 Gaza War, commemorations of Nakba Day in various locations, mourning on Facebook of Palestinians killed by Israeli forces, a photography exchange arranged by Bishara between Jaffa and Aida Refugee Camp, and kinship and care work during incarceration. Chapters are separated by narrative interludes in which Bishara recounts her experiences crossing the Green Line. [1] She refers to these interludes as "Passages". [5]
Choice recommended Crossing a Line in 2023, describing it as a critical and revealing work of research, and praising its accessibility to general readers as well as academics. [4] PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review praised the "vivid detail" of Bishara's writing. [6]
A 2023 review in Race & Class discussed Crossing a Line alongside Palestine Hijacked by Thòmas Suárez, praising both as "works that combine intellectual rigour with a commitment to justice for the dispossessed". [2] The review described the book as "a meticulous study of Israel’s continuing domination and steady appropriation through multiple forms of fragmentation, immobilisation, ghettoisation and violence". [7] Also in 2023, a review in Against the Current praised the book's focus on "ordinary Palestinians" [8] and described it as a "refreshing" text. [9]
The Gaza Strip, or simply Gaza, is a polity and the smaller of the two Palestinian territories. On the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, Gaza is bordered by Egypt on the southwest and Israel on the east and north.
The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is an ongoing military and political conflict about self-determination within the territory of the former Mandatory Palestine. Key aspects of the conflict include the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the status of Jerusalem, Israeli settlements, borders, security, water rights, Palestinian freedom of movement, and the Palestinian right of return.
An Israeli checkpoint, is a barrier erected by the Israeli Security Forces, primarily today part of the system of West Bank closures in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The checkpoints are, according to Israel, intended to enhance security of Israel and Israeli settlements. Israeli checkpoints may be staffed by the Israeli Military Police, the Israel Border Police, or other soldiers.
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Marwan Bishara is a Palestinian Arab, born in Nazareth, Israel. He is currently an author, columnist and the senior political analyst for Al Jazeera English From 2007 to 2014, Bishara was the editor and host of their flagship programme Empire, which examined global powers and their agendas in a fusion of documentary and debate with politicians, generals, philosophers, academics, novelists, movie directors, and activists from the world over. He has been described as "one of the Arab world's leading public intellectuals" and writes extensively on global politics and is widely considered a leading authority on the Middle East and international affairs.
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The West Bank, including East Jerusalem, has been under military occupation by Israel since 7 June 1967, when Israeli forces captured the territory, then ruled by Jordan, during the Six-Day War. The status of the West Bank as a militarily occupied territory has been affirmed by the International Court of Justice and, with the exception of East Jerusalem, by the Israeli Supreme Court. The official view of the Israeli government is that the laws of belligerent occupation do not apply to the territories, which it considers instead "disputed", and it administers the West Bank, excepting East Jerusalem, under the Israeli Civil Administration, a branch of the Israeli Ministry of Defense. Considered to be a classic example of an "intractable conflict", the length of Israel's occupation was already regarded as exceptional after two decades, and is now the longest in modern history. Israel has cited several reasons for retaining the West Bank within its ambit: a claim based on the notion of historic rights to this as a homeland as claimed in the Balfour Declaration of 1917; security grounds, both internal and external; and the deep symbolic value for Jews of the area occupied.
Israeli torture in the occupied territories refers to the use of torture and systematic degrading practices on Palestinians detained by Israeli forces in both the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The practice, routine for decades, was eventually reviewed by the Supreme Court of Israel in 1999, which found that "coercive interrogation" of Palestinians had been widespread, and deemed it unlawful, though permissible in certain cases. Torture is also practiced by the Palestinian authorities in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Declarations of State Land in the West Bank are declarations by Israeli authorities that Palestinian land is "state land", that is, land that may be legally administered by an occupying power on a temporary basis under international law, on the theory that the occupier is holding the territory in trust until sovereignty can be restored. It was and is the principal method used by the governments of Mandatory Palestine and Israel respectively, to acquire land from Palestinians and sell it to Israeli settlers. According to B'Tselem, it was used to expropriate 16% of the West Bank.
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The Nakba was the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Mandatory Palestine during the 1948 Palestine war through their violent displacement and dispossession of land, property and belongings, along with the destruction of their society, culture, identity, political rights, and national aspirations. The term is also used to described the ongoing persecution and displacement of Palestinians by Israel. As a whole, it covers the shattering of Palestinian society and the long-running rejection of the right of return for Palestinian refugees and their descendants.
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